Allan Appel Photo
In their first public debate, two candidates for state representative clashed over how to solve the city’s homeless problem.
Debra Hauser declared moral outrage at the city’s failure to keep the Columbus Avenue shelter from closing early this year; Roland Lemar defended the city and called for statewide tax reforms.
That was one issue Hauser, a former Democratic co-chair in East Rock’s Ward 10, and Lemar, the current alderman in East Rock’s Ward 9, discussed before 20 Yale College Democrats in the common room of the university’s Branford College Monday night.
It was the first and only scheduled public debate between the two contenders for the Democratic nomination for the 96th District General Assembly seat, which is being vacated by Cameron Staples as he runs for attorney general. The two have emerged as the sole contenders after a third candidate, Hamden’s Michael D’Agostino, recently dropped out of the race.
The candidates gave brief opening speeches, then took questions from the undergrads. The candidates agreed on many issues. On most questions, Hauser, appearing in her first-ever candidate forum, gave general answers; Lemar, who’s been an alderman for over three years, gave specific policy solutions.
One student asked how to reduce the number of homeless people on the street.
“I have three solutions to homelessness: housing, housing, housing,” Hauser replied. In an impassioned response, she took aim at the city: It has failed to live up to its moral obligation to fund Columbus House, she said.
Lemar countered, saying the problem didn’t lend itself to a “one-stop solution.” He cited those with long-term mental health issues, and others such as abused women who needed perhaps two weeks or two months of transitional housing.
Lemar defended the city, saying New Haven does more than many cities to help the homeless. He called for statewide property tax reform that would give urban centers relief from shouldering the burden for regional problems like homelessness.
The debate was Hauser’s first formal appearance as a candidate running for beyond-the-ward office, and she admitted to being a little nervous. She spoke passionately of a sense of mission to make government work far better for kids and families.
Describing her many visits to Newhallville as a staffer with the Yale Child Study Center (she’s a clinical psychologist), a volunteer at sub-station programs, and mom going to pick up her 14-year-old daughter at friends’ houses, she said, “I felt unmistakably called to do something about the hopelessness in the eyes of [many]kids in Newhallville.”
Hauser said that her campaign is premised on “essential fairness and equal opportunity for all.”
Asked to choose a single issue on which to make progress, she chose the economy. “The way to grow jobs is to make business welcome.” She cited the extremely high utility costs, and the state’s being 49th in the nation in job creation.
Lemar said education is his top priority. “Education is job growth,” he said, as well as quality of life.
While he hailed the city’s school reform effort as an important first step, he several times called attention to a bill State Reps. Gary Holder-Winfield and Jason Bartlett are shepherding through the legislature, which he said, would recast the way the education issue is discussed.
“Education is a social justice issue,” Lemar said. “We used to make excuses, but Achievement First and Amistad proved it wrong. Individualized assessment, wrap-around services,” and approaching teaching as a serious profession are taking the fear out of the discussion of the schools.
“It all has to be on the table. We can’t improve the economy without doing this first,” Lemar said.
By “this” he meant bringing more equity to the Educational Cost Sharing formula, and in general restructuring the state income tax to make it more equitable so that municipalities don’t rely on the property tax alone to fund schools and just about everything else.
When freshman Luke Hawbaker (pictured in foreground) asked the candidates about their approach to curbing street violence, Hauser pointed to her resume: She cited her leadership in the National Center of Children Exposed to Violence, and the need for “early detection or access to mental health services.”
Lemar, on the other hand, recited chapter and verse of the programs currently in place: Youth at Work, which hires some 1200 kids a year; the Street Outreach Workers program, and some additional monies expected for young people’s employment from the feds.
Hawbaker said he was impressed with the passion of both candidates, but he thought Lemar had more “well-thought out and specific” answers.
After the friendly debate’s conclusion, Hauser gave her own candidate assessment of her first public foray. “I think I did okay. I didn’t faint. I loved the questions. I’m not an alderman so I don’t know all the issues. But I’m in it for the right reasons. I’m a quick study and I’m in it to make Connecticut a better place.”
For his part, Lemar said that people ask him if he’s crazy to be running for the assembly at a time when Connecticut’s best days are behind. “I’m not for the bleak picture,” he declared to the students. “The best of Connecticut [days] is in front of us. I firmly believe it. We just need to make the right decisions.”
Those decisions – on public education, a more progressive tax system, and correcting the economic inequities that make people want to leave the state, among others – will be left to new leadership that’s elected in November, Lemar said.
“I think I can hit the ground running. We face a crisis that is without peer. If we don’t make the right policy decisions in the first four months next year, we’ll [negatively] affect the state for the next 20.”